Panorama software

[DjBeau]

Hi

I've been trying to find out what the best 360 photography software would be - a stitching program.

What do you prefer?

 

[Socrates]

Hi

I've been trying to find out what the best 360 photography software would be - a stitching program.

What do you prefer?

Certainly Photoshop will do it but it costs a bundle. Photoshop Elements is a much less expensive alternative.

 

[ann]

check out serif
they have a program called panoramaplus3 tht is great and less than 50dollars.

 

[Socrates]

check out serif
they have a program called panoramaplus3 tht is great and less than 50dollars.

I made a $1 profit when I got the latest version of PSE! The selling price was $89. Adobe had a $50 rebate and Amazon had a $40 rebate.

 

[DjBeau]

So PS can actually do it. Nice, I did not know that

 

[DjBeau]

Ok, so I took a fast, crappy photo of my room to test the panorama thing. Of course I did it on a tripod but something is very wrong here:

Did it go wrong because my tripod wasn't in level (there's no leveling-thingie on my tripod)? Or because I was on lowest focal lenght so there might be some lens distortion?

 

[Mystwalker]

Did you shoot in manual mode? I've never tried it myself, but am guessing you need to keep aperture and shutter speed constant throughout.

Some of your affects are strangely cool I have to try this in Elements.

 

[BoblyBill]

I do all my pano's by hand in CS3 (mostly because of the wide angled shots give programs a hard time which is exactly what is happening to yours). I have heard of some good things from PanoramaStudio. A friend of mine used it to do this shot.

 

[Alex_B]

if you do not rotate around the nodal point of your lens (requires a special panorama head.), then you will get parallax shifts from one image to the next, and with things in the foreground and the background, correct stitching will be a nightmare or even impossible.

Oh, yes, and as BoblyBill pointed out .. PanoramaStudio is my weapon of choice

 

[JerryPH]

Autostitch is free and very good. AutoPano is EXCELLENT, but has a price. Both are better/easier than stitching in CS2/CS3.

Google either one for their website links.

 

[ann]

if the exposure changes, don't change the fstop as that will effect the depth of field, change shutter speed.

 

[DjBeau]

I had a fixed shutter and aperture so the problem must be the lens distortion. Which means, I guess, that I should

a) get a fixed lens in stead of a zoom
b) zoom in a little so the distortion will disappear

Maybe I'll try some demos of the programs yo've mentioned and find out what I like.

Thanks

 

[ann]

i would also suggest manual focus, no zooming, just pick a focal length and stick with it.

 

[DjBeau]

i would also suggest manual focus, no zooming, just pick a focal length and stick with it.

Absolutely, and I did I'm quite convinced, now, that the problem was lens distortion.

 

[Alex_B]

I had a fixed shutter and aperture so the problem must be the lens distortion. Which means, I guess, that I should

a) get a fixed lens in stead of a zoom
b) zoom in a little so the distortion will disappear

Maybe I'll try some demos of the programs yo've mentioned and find out what I like.

Thanks

a) no
b) no

the point is, that even with the best lens you project onto the planar sensor or film which has no curvature , but then you get a mismatch when trying to stitch two exposures which are projected onto different planes (planes at different angles as you rotate the camera).
This problem is largest with ultrawide angle and smallest with tele lenses since here the angular mismatch is the smallest.

but it is not a distortion problem.

you actually need to digitally transform your planar projection into a cylindrical projection, and then the stitching works perfectly. and this is basically what the stitching software does. (you can also transform all exposures into planar exposures with the planes parallel to each other, that also works).